About this issue: Overview
Black Grape stood apart from their mostly beige coloured Britpop peers when they emerged from the ashes of the Happy Mondays 20 years ago, but drug and health problems meant it was short lived. Richard Smirke chats to Shaun Ryder and Paul Leveridge over G&Ts and finds they’re finally living up to the promise of their debut.
Drew Povey has been likened to a Hollywood heartthrob, but to children and staff at his Salford school he’s more like a comic superhero. The headteacher at the centre of Channel 4’s Educating Greater Manchester tells Gary Ryan the real transformation has been the school’s – and the real stars are his 900 students.
Some world leaders don’t need a cartoonist to make them look grotesque or ridiculous, but none are exempt from a savage inking. Caitlin Hawkins visits a new exhibition celebrating a long tradition of political cartoons.
On our news pages this week we speak to s collective of former sex workers that have come together to speak out again punitive measures against women working on Hull’s notorious Hessle Road, and we hear about a new baby bed box scheme in Leeds.
In our arts section we round up the best things happening across the north next week, chat to the director of a new play about a group of dispossessed kids in Leeds and review the new Foo Fighters album.
The 85-year-old Beast of Bolsover, Labour MP Dennis Skinner writes a letter to his younger self and imagines a career in the arts and we have our usual crossword and Sudoku, plus a competition to win tickets to the Great Northern Contemporary Craft Fair.